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First integrated circuit with nanotube transistors created

January 6, 2004 | Source: KurzweilAI

UC Berkeley and Stanford Researchers have created the first working integrated circuit that successfully incorporates carbon nanotubes.

They developed the integrated circuit to speed the analysis of thousands of synthesized carbon nanotubes, sorting them into metallic and semiconducting nanotubes. To do that, they grew carbon nanotubes directly onto “islands” on the circuit platform that contained the necessary catalyst for nanotube synthesis.

By turning certain switches on and off, researchers were able to isolate the paths that lead to individual nanotubes. If they were able to change the conductivity of the nanotube, they knew that it was a semiconductor and not metallic.

In the process, they demonstrated the broader proof of principle that nanotubes can be successfully integrated in a complex circuit.